Bob Reich's Ideas - Revisited

Robert Reich is that glib voice you hear on the public radio proclaiming he knows public policy best. He was Clinton's labor secretary and has had a bunch of academic posts at some pretty good places. I had the opportunity to clean out a briefcase today and found a WSJ editorial that Reich penned in March. In "Obamanomics Isn't About Big Government" he made the fanciful argument that Mr. Obama's administration was not a "return to big government." Hmmm. I wonder what it should be called.

Reich asserted that "The real distinction between Obamanomics and Reaganomics involves government's role in achieving growth and broad based prosperity." Indeed, that is true. But then Reich tried to turn reality on its head. "The animating idea of Reaganomics was that the economy grows best from the top down." Reich admits that Reagan's administration "marked the beginning of one of the longest bull markets in American history" (that is true) - he then goes on to claim that all those gains went to the wealthy.(that is not true) I guess Mr. Reich didn't bother to look at the rapid increase in the percentage of Americans owing stock over the last several decades. After Reagan Americans had more control over their own destinies. That involves risk. But that risk offers a real opportunity for people to pursue what the founders called "happiness."

Reich then went on to claim that under Obamanomics an economy grows best from "the bottom up." Not sure how to interpret that Bob - in less than one year the current administration has burdened every American with tons of new debt. That certainly will bring all of us closer to the bottom but I am not sure that is what Reich was trying to argue. The current administration has raised deficit spending (which Reich criticized under the last administration) to levels unheard of except in banana republics.

I am sure Reich is off making some other absurd argument about how all those new levels of deficits (to get an idea of how large a trillion dollars is imagine a stack of $1000 bills that would be 67 miles high - for each $1 trillion) are really good for us all. But it was fun to read his arguments again. I am sure he has forgotten them - but we should not.